How much did the top 500 chains grow last year? What is egg coffee? Which chain wants to go public? Is a smaller restaurant really better? Answers to these questions and more, This Week in Foodservice.

U.S. retail and foodservice sales increased 1.7% in March, per data from the U.S. Census Bureau. This is greater than the 0.7% February sales increase and it marks the fastest monthly growth rate in more than three years, per a CNN analysis.

The main reason for the growth: a record spike in gas prices. Compared to March of 2025, monthly sales increased 4.0%. Total sales for the January 2026 through March 2026 period were up 3.7% from the same period a year ago.

Sales at foodservice and drinking places increased 2.4% from March 2025.

Foodservice News

• Foodservice continues to play a bigger and bigger role in the success of convenience stores. C-store foodservice and merchandise sales increased 1.7% in2025, per the State of the Industry report released by the National Association of Convenience Stores. Total convenience store sales, including in-store purchases and fuel, totaled $817.5 billon. Foodservice accounted for 28.5% of in-store sales in 2025, up 11.9% from 2005. Its impact on profitability is even greater, contributing 38.9% of in-store gross profit dollars in 2025.
• Sales among the top 500 restaurant chains totaled more than $450 billion in 2025, per data from Technomic. The top 500 now has more than 240,000 locations and account for more than 5% of annual retail spending by U.S. consumers, Technomic added. Not all of the news was good, however, given that 2025 marked the fourth consecutive year where sales among the top 500 chains decelerated compared to the previous year.
• Customer traffic patterns continued to favor fast-casual and quick-service restaurants during the first quarter of 2026, per the March 2026 Placer.ai Dining Index. For the period fast-casual operators saw consumer visits increase 3.1% year-over-year and QSR visits were up 0.1%. In contrast, visits to full-service restaurants declined 1.4%. All three segments saw an increase in monthly visits in February compared to the previous year, followed by a drop-off in March. Data also shows weekday visits boosted traffic across all three segments, compared to weekends (Friday through Sunday). For example, fast-casual visits grew 4.7% year over year on weekdays in the first quarter but only 1.3% on weekends.
• Will Jersey Mike’s be the next restaurant chain to go public? The wheels are in motion to take the company public. The 3,000-plus unit sandwich chain confidentially filed for an initial public offering, per a variety of published reports, including this one from CNBC. This comes more than one year after Blackstone bought a majority stake in Jersey Mike’s in a deal valued at approximately $8 billion.
• Smaller format restaurants continue to maintain their appeal from an operator’s perspective. The latest example comes courtesy of Buffalo Wild Wings. The chain’s Buffalo Wild Wings Go concept opened a net 79 restaurants in 2025, per a FSR story. The chain plans to open another 75 this year. In contrast, Buffalo Wild Wings traditional full-service units declined by a net of five locations in 2025. Finances may be one possible reason the smaller units have more franchisee appeal at the moment. The cost to begin operation of a BWW GO Restaurant franchise ranges from $375,845–$919,500 compared to $2.464 million to $4.9 million for a traditional Buffalo Wild Wings restaurant, the story added.
• Dairy Queen will expand its testing of AI at the drive thru to at least 25 franchisees, per a Restaurant Dive story. The chain began testing AI at the drive-thrus of some company owned locations. Dairy Queen’s goal is to rollout AI at all 3,000 of its U.S. and Canadian drive thrus. The deployment will happen in phases.
• McDonald’s beverage lineup will get a refreshing jolt next month. In May, the Chicago-based restaurant chain will add refreshers and crafted sodas to its beverage menu, per multiple stories, including this one from CBS News. McD’s also plans to introduce new energy drinks later this year.
• Another caffeine craze is scrambling social media, so to speak. Originally from Vietnam, the drink known as egg coffee is made by blending egg yolks with sugar and condensed milk and is steaming its way through many a social media feed. The fluffy drink tastes like dessert, or so I am told, and many social media users compare it to a marshmallow, per a Fox News story. Other cultures have similar drinks, the story adds. Not everyone is a fan, though, with one social media user saying “it tastes like salmonella.” Speaking of salmonella, because the egg yolks are not cooked, drinkers of this coffee run the risk of being exposed to the bacteria. So there’s that, too.
• Would you pay $105 for a cup of coffee? That’s the price customers at San Francisco’s Wild Fox are paying for a coffee made from beans grown in Brazil and roasted in Tokyo, per a story from The Food Institute. While the sticker shock is notable, it also speaks to the fact that the price of coffee at restaurants overall has increased 5.4%, or 1.5 percentage points, since last year. Coffee prices continue to grow faster than food prices. Not to be out done, at-home-coffee prices continue to increase quickly, too. In other words, don’t chug your coffee. At these prices it’s important to savor every sip.
• Commercial kitchen equipment manufacturer Ojeda U.S.A. has opened a warehouse in Reno, Nev. The company also has warehouses in the on the East Coast and in the South Central region of the U.S.

Economic News

• Industrial production declined 0.5% in March but still grew at an annual rate of 2.4% in the first quarter, per data from the U.S. Federal Reserve. Similarly, manufacturing output ticked down 0.1% in March yet grew at a 3.0% rate in the first quarter. Capacity utilization receded to 75.7%, which is 3.7 percentage points less than its long-run (1972–2025) average.
• Is the Iran war slowing the global economy? The International Monetary Fund says yes. The IMF now expects the global economy will grow 3.1% in 2026, a 0.2 percentage point downgrade from its January forecast, per a CNN story. This modest revision assumes that the war will be “relatively short-lived,” it says. The IMF also project global inflation will rise 4.4% this year. The IMF prediction is the latest from a growing cohort of economists and organizations, including the Asian Development Bank and the United Nations, warning of the economic toll of a lengthy war in Iran.
• Another week, another study that shows the consumer mindset continues to slide. The latest example comes from the LSEG/Ipsos Primary Consumer Sentiment Index, which now sits at 50.0. The index last dropped to less than 50 in June of 2023 when it hit 49.6. That was during the inflation crisis of 2022-2023. Prior to that, the last time it was that low was in December 2020, hitting 48.1 as the country was in the throes of the COVID recession. This current consumer malaise could lead to them racking up more debt. More people say they are more likely to buy something if a store offers a buy-now-pay-later option, up to 35% from 29% last July, according to new data from the Ipsos Consumer Tracker